Race

A race is a population of humans distinguished from other populations. The most widely used racial categories are based on visible traits (especially skin color and facial features). Conceptions of race, as well as specific racial groupings, vary by culture and time and are often controversial due to their impact on social identity hence identity politics.

Case studies in the social construction of race

Race in the United States

In the United States since its early history, Native Americans, African-Americans and European-Americans were classified as belonging to different races. But the criteria for membership in these races were radically different. The government considered anyone with "one drop" of "Black blood" (or indigenous African ancestry) to be Black. In contrast, Indians were defined by a certain percentage of "Indian blood" due in large part to American slavery ethics. To be White, one had to have "pure" White ancestry. These differing criteria for assignation of membership to particular races had relatively little to do with biology and far more to do with White supremacy—the social, geopolitical and economic agendas of dominant Whites vis-à-vis subordinate Blacks and Native Americans—and racism. At the time, Blacks were valuable commodities as slaves; and Native Americans, whose vast lands were the ultimate target of acquisition in a doctrine of Manifest Destiny, were subject to marginalization and multiple episodic localized campaigns of extermination.

Related Topics:
One drop - American slavery ethics - White supremacy - Racism - Commodities - Manifest Destiny

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According to such anthropologists as Gerald Sider, the goal of such racial designations was to concentrate power, wealth, privilege and land in the hands of Caucasians in a society of White hegemony and White privilege (Sider 1996; see also Fields 1990). Using the "one drop" rule, it was easy for someone to be categorized as Black. The offspring of an African slave and a White master or mistress was considered Black. Significant in terms of the economics of slavery, such a person also would be a chattel slave, adding to the wealth of the slaveowner. By comparison, it was harder for someone to be classified as Indian. A person of Indian and African parentage automatically was classified as Black. By contrast, the offspring of only a few generations of miscegenation between Indians and Whites likely would not have been considered Indian at all—at least not in a legal sense. Indians could have treaty rights to land, but because an individual with one Indian great-grandparent no longer was classified as Indian, they lost any legal claim to Indian land. The irony is that the same individuals who could be denied legal standing because they were "too White" to claim property rights, were still Indian enough to be considered as "breeds," stigmatized for their Native American ancestry. In an economy that benefited from slave labor, it was useful to have as many Blacks as possible. Conversely, in a nation bent on westward expansion, it was advantageous to diminish the numbers of those who could claim title to Indian lands by simply defining them out of existence. At a time when Whites wielded power over both Blacks and Indians and widely believed in their inherent superiority over people of color, it is no coincidence that the hardest racial group in which to prove membership was the White one.

Related Topics:
Gerald Sider - Slave - Economics of slavery - Chattel slave - Slaveowner - Treaty rights - Slave labor

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Race in Brazil

Compared to 19th-century United States, 20th-century Brazil was characterized by a relative absence of sharply defined racial groups. This pattern reflects a different history and different social relations. Basically, race in Brazil was biologized, but in a way that recognized the difference between ancestry (which determines genotype) and phenotypic differences. There, racial identity was not governed by a rigid descent rule. A Brazilian child was never automatically identified with the racial type of one or both parents, nor were there only two categories to choose from. Over a dozen racial categories would be recognized in conformity with the combinations of hair color, hair texture, eye color, and skin color. These types grade into each other like the colors of the spectrum, and no one category stands significantly isolated from the rest. That is, race referred to appearance, not heredity.

Related Topics:
Brazil - Social relations

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One of the most striking consequences of the Brazilian demographics and system of racial identification was that parents and children and even brothers and sisters were frequently accepted as representatives of opposite racial types. In a fishing village in the state of Bahia, an investigator showed 100 people pictures of three sisters and were asked to identify the races of each. In only six responses were the sisters identified by the same racial term. Fourteen responses used a different term for each sister. In another experiment nine portraits were shown to a hundred people. Forty different racial types were elicited. It was found, in addition, that a given Brazilian might be called by as many as thirteen different terms by other members of the community. These terms are spread out across practically the entire spectrum of theoretical racial types. A further consequence of the absence of a descent rule was that Brazilians apparently not only disagreed about the racial identity of specific individuals, but they also seemed to be in disagreement about the abstract meaning of the racial terms as defined by words and phrases. For example, 40% of a sample ranked moreno claro as a lighter type than mulato claro, while 60% reversed this order. A further note of confusion is that one person might employ different racial terms to describe the same person over a short time span. The choice of which racial description to use may vary according to both the personal relationships and moods of the individuals involved. The Brazilian census lists one's race according to the preference of the person being interviewed. As a consequence, hundreds of races appeared in the census results, ranging from blue (which is blacker than the usual black) to green (which is whiter than the usual white).

Related Topics:
Brazilian demographics - Bahia - Moreno claro - Mulato claro - Brazilian census

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Consequently, people change their racial identity over their lifetimes. To do so is not the same as "passing" in the U.S. It does not require the secrecy and the agonizing withdrawal from friends and family that are necessary in the United States and among Indians of highland Latin America. In Brazil, passing from one race to another can occur with changes in education and economic status. Moreover, a light-skinned person of low status is considered darker than a dark-skinned person of high status.

Related Topics:
Passing - Latin America

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So, although the identification of a person by race is far more fluid and flexible in Brazil than in the U.S., there still are racial stereotypes and prejudices. African features have been considered less desirable; Blacks have been considered socially inferior, and Whites superior. These white supremacist values seem to be an obvious legacy of European colonization and the slave-based plantation system. The complexity of racial classifications in Brazil is reflective of the extent of miscegenation in Brazilian society, which remains highly, but not strictly, stratified along color lines.

Related Topics:
Supremacist - Plantation system - Miscegenation - Brazilian society - Stratified

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